Michael Kugelman of the Woodrow Wilson International Center, argues that the factors that first sparked many of the land acquisitions during the global food crisis of 2007-08 — population growth, high food prices, unpredictable commodities markets, water shortages, and above all a plummeting supply of arable land — remain firmly in place today. He writes that land-lusting nations and investors are driven by immediate needs, and they have neither the incentive nor the obligation to slow down and adjust their investments in response to the wishes of distant international bureaucrats. This, he argues, has serious consequences for global security.